Richie Rees is ace at upsetting the oppoenent scrum half and delivery at scrum time ...

how legal is it .....?

He encroaches 'behind' the ball but near when the ball is about to emerge he places his leg 'apparently' in front of the ball behind the opponent scrum and has positoned himself at the back of the scrum ready to pounce on his opponent scrum half as he attempts to play the ball, often his foot is behind the opponent scrum before the ball emerges. Also, in the final manoeuvre because of lack of balance in stretching his leg he often maintains balance by holding on to a member of the opponent scrum.

Other scrum halves use a smilar tactic eg Parra but it's never reffed..

What are the laws and are any offended in this process ?

It seems to be an 'unfair' disruption of a good heel and a lot like when I played blidside wing forward and was allowed to track the ball through the opponent scrum and is a relatively new adoption/adaption.

Thks in advance

Sat Oct 23, 2010 7:52 am

Jonboytaff

World XV Player

Joined: Wed Feb 03, 2010 9:01 pmPosts: 3349Location: Philly

Re: Opponent scrum half at scrumtime ??

Cheers for the diversion from another thread...What Rees did against the Scarlets i.e. sticking his boot in the scrum before it is out is certainly not legal.The emphasis so far this season has been on encouraging quick ball but the Scarlets were unable to get quick ball from scrums in which they hammered the opposition because the oppo. 9 kept sticking his boot in or was tackling before the ball was out.Refs need to be wise to this. It was very frustrating.

Sat Oct 23, 2010 11:07 am

ICEverything

World XV Player

Joined: Thu May 18, 2006 4:39 pmPosts: 35127

Re: Opponent scrum half at scrumtime ??

In my opinion, the refs don't give enough protection to the scrum half putting the ball into the scrum. Rees for instance gets away with far too much. In my simple mind, I think that if a scrum half manages to disrupt more than one (or two at most) scrums, then he is doing something illegal, especially if it is a solid scrum.

I personally think that the many ways that players find to cheat in a game, is actually spoiling the game as a spectacle.

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Tue Oct 26, 2010 12:26 pm

Keith L

World XV Player

Joined: Thu Jun 03, 2004 8:40 amPosts: 30772Location: Somewhere nice

Re: Opponent scrum half at scrumtime ??

Get em to ref putting the bloody ball in straight first, then there may not be the need to cheat!

Tue Oct 26, 2010 12:58 pm

Chris ScumV

Site Admin

Joined: Tue Apr 27, 2004 4:28 pmPosts: 57616Location: Sunny Resolven

Re: Opponent scrum half at scrumtime ??

The law is the ball is the offside line, so as long as he has one foot between the ball and his own goal line, he is legal, UNLESS he interferes with the scrum. Technically he is not supposed to touch an opposition player until the ball is out, but they all do.

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Chris is spot on, the offside line for a scrum half is the ball. You have to be behind it but you must make sure you don't interfere with the scrum by touching players in it. The trick I used to do to cause disruption was to catch the arm of the scrum half as he was passing it away. I would track around with him as is totally legal for the other scrum half then as he passed it knock his arm and the ball would go to ground somewhere towards the fly half. I used to get the odd ref say it was illegal as the ball was not out or that I was offside, but I would counter with I was behind the ball and as the ball was in the other scrum halfs hands how could it still be in the scrum. It usually worked unless I had some complete numpty ref who thought the offside line was the front row of the scrum which is totally wrong.

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